Search for Xanadu

In search of Xanadu

Bliss is neither happiness or misery. It is the absence of both. 



Happiness is the attachment while misery is the repulsion. Our brains are wired for either reward or punishment. It inherently carries incentive salience, as reward and pleasure pathways in the brain reveal under research. Indeed, behavioural economics is now clearly revealing that economics is the study of Incentives, rather than rational choices, which was what was earlier understood. 

As Desmond Morris argues Happiness is not achieved when there is contentment, far from it. Happiness is a transient stage when 'things are improving for the better'. The desire for happiness arises from the mind of the idealist. It is future oriented. It is a goal to be sought for. What is, is not good enough. What could be, and its possibilities is what is sought for. In this lies the 'living trap'.  We go on looking for the myth of happiness. What we have we do not value, and whatever is given is only transient, then it no longer satisfies. Nobody really seems to be able to give what we want, and we are not sure really what we want to. 

Happiness is just one side of the coin: buy one and you get misery free. All happy states comes to an end and misery sets in soon after. Think of a time when you have been intensely happy. How long has that period lasted, and after that? Think of something you thought would make you happy, but now no longer does. Happiness is an experience - enjoying a sony walkman, a ride in one's motorcycle, for example for me. 

Happiness is desire fulfilled but for a moment. 
Yet, desire can never be satiated. Desire is like oil that one pours into a flame. The intensity only grows. While with an increase in income, misery is lessened, the state of happiness remains stagnant after a while. Remember, Bill Gates happiness is similar with many others, though it does not seem like that for many.

This desire for happiness needs to be reexamined itself. Is it a goal worth having? 

When one truly realises that one is attached to desire and it is this desire that creates suffering. Buddha calls this 'Dhuka" often translated as misery. Perhaps, we should reexamine it as 'unsatisfactoriness' or distress over something. Gautama Buddha argues that the Middle Path is the way. Neither chase desire or abstain from desiring. Instead drop desiring itself. What otherwise is referred to as attachment. This non identification with objects of desire is what needs to be interrogated. Also, to remember there is NOWHERE to go, as in mind wandering, but to stay NOW HERE. A wandering mind gathers anxiety. A visualisation of happiness does not make lasting happiness. Research has established that mind wandering is a cause, not a consequence. Yet, happiness is most when one is in flow. In the moment, in full rapt attention to this moment.

"It’s so much better to desire than to have. The moment of desire is the most extraordinary

moment. The moment of desire, when you know something is going to happen, says Anouk Aimee.

that’s the most exalting". Truth does not cause pain no matter how significant it is what is revealed. The pain comes from resisting the false self, the pretence we have so carefully protected. It is this persona that which we refuse to let go, that causes the pain. All changes take place when there is a personal crisis, when the self realises that what has been held so dearly is a hypocrisy that he/she would now have to drop. It is this reluctance to drop, that is indeed painful.

Just as a pendulum swings to one direction it is gathering the momentum to swing to the other side and vice versa. So it is with all emotions. The two sides are counterpoints: they exist together. Friendship invites hatred. Happiness invites misery. Life invites death. Strength invites weakness. Understand this. If you are attached to one the other is also an attachment. 

Just love is total freedom. Love creates the poetry. The soul emerges, the ego dies. But examine what you now call love.

All that you love is often a source of hatred, fear and anxiety. This is the mind that creates the false notion of love. It is but a notion, a thought, the mind continues to exist. True love is total surrender. True love is intelligent. It surrenders what does not exist: the false self, the ego. Love is a continuous present verb, not a noun. Either you are loving someone or you are not. So why do we say, we love our spouse? We love our work? Why the doubt? 

You are loving. Loving is you. It is your existence. Your very being. What is the focus of your love is your essence. Your essence is your expression of your essence. It is your own decision. 

Likewise non love is also you. It is your existence. Your very being. What you focus with your non love is your essence. It is your decision. 

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We are complete, all that is our essence comes from our within. Everything is your decision. Your entire life is your decision. Your choices. Take responsibility for it. Don't play games with your freedom that is you. Truth liberates. Remember that you are free. Freedom is you.

There can be everlasting bouts of bliss to one who is a meditator who has long practised and by rigorous discipline  and training, but many may advocate that this may be pointless when so much joy exists in the world outside, why forego it for serenity within. They would rather prefer the passions of living to bliss within.

In the meanwhile, we go on looking for Xanadu, the promised Utopia for happiness. If not in this world then the next. 

Read also two related article on happiness, As long as the other exists', and 'what ensures success' in a previous post.                                                       

http://stevecorrea7.blogspot.in/2014/12/as-long-as-other-exists.html
http://stevecorrea7.blogspot.in/2012/10/0-0-1-1792-10217-steve-correa.html
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Here are Summary points on The Nature of happiness written by Desmond Morris

Herein below are some ways which make us happy....

1.     Target happiness as a result of successful efforts to achieve a specific target. (Fiero - German)

2. Competitive happiness as a result of winning a struggle against other people. In the most extreme

form, this is the happiness of the sadist and the torturer. (Schadenfreude)

3. Co-operative happiness as a result of helping other people.

4. Genetic happiness as a consequence of reproducing ones genes by falling in love, pair bonding,

giving birth and successfully rearing the offspring. (Naches)

5. Sensual happiness as a result of hedonistic experiences like eating, drinking and sex.

6. Cerebral happiness as a result of intellectual activities like playing games, artistic creativity and

scientific research.

7. Rhythmic happiness as a result of activities like dancing, music, singing, aerobics, gymnastics

and athletics.

8. Painful happiness as a result physical or mental masochism, like self-chastisement or the

masochism of puritans who deny themselves every pleasure in life.

9. Dangerous happiness as a result of taking sensational risks as in gambling and in such extreme

sports as mountain climbing and parachuting.

10. Selective happiness as a result of ignoring reality and concentrating on one's own emotions, like

Nero fiddling while Rome was burning.

11. Tranquil happiness as a result of meditation.

12. Devout happiness as a result of worshipping, like in Lour-des and Mecca.

13. Negative happiness as a result of eliminating or dealing with specific causes of unhappiness, like

dressing entirely in black for the rest of one's life after the death of a child.

14. Chemical happiness as a result of taking drugs, alcohol and smoking.

15. Fantasy happiness as a result of daydreaming, supported by books, films and television.

16. Comic happiness brought on by humor and laughter.

17. Accidental happiness as a result of good luck, if your suitcase comes up first on the carousel after a long and tiring flight on a jumbo jet.

Other material related to this can be accessed on Ted Talks. Few examples

http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_gilbert_asks_why_are_we_happy?language=en#t-9258
https://www.ted.com/talks/matthieu_ricard_on_the_habits_of_happiness
https://www.ted.com/talks/matt_killingsworth_want_to_be_happier_stay_in_the_moment?language=en

summary: In conclusion, a human mind is a wandering mind, and a wandering mind is an unhappy mind.The ability to think about what is not happening is a cognitive achievement that comes at an emotional

cost.https://www.ted.com/talks/nancy_etcoff_on_happiness_and_why_we_want_it?language=en